


making islands where no islands should go

by horchatita394



Series: standing on the surface of a perforated sphere [1]
Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Guilt, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-10
Updated: 2015-03-10
Packaged: 2018-03-17 05:40:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3517490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/horchatita394/pseuds/horchatita394
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He falls to a crouch. Too fast. Everything with Connor is always so fast. “What is it?”<br/>“It’s fine.” He says, with another try at the failed smile.<br/>“What is it?”<br/>“Some lab work,” Oliver says with a shrug. “I can probably still drive you to the airport? Or reschedule. It’ll be fine.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	making islands where no islands should go

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt from anon was: Any chance of a fic where Conner has to go abroad for the summer (maybe something for law school, or his family, or whatever) and Oliver has to stay in Philly for work?
> 
> I don't think poor Nonnie expected 1.5K+ of pure one scene angst. But, alas. 
> 
> This takes place in the Summer after the finale.

Oliver nods, slowly and so aware of Connor’s eyes on his back. “Two months.”

Connor’s voice is always a little frantic. Almost always. Never in the dark, never in bed. But otherwise. “Don’t you have like sick days saved up …or…”

“Not a 2 months’ worth,” Oliver laughs. “I could hardly get a week if I tired and… I might need my sick days. For doctor’s appointments.”

“Right.” The lead weight falls on Connor’s flighty tone. “Yeah of course.”

“Besides it’d be all my savings and the meds are…” he takes a deep breath and gives a valiant attempt at a smile. “It’s only a couple of months.”

“Yeah.” Connor nods, quick again, like a buzzing bee. “Yeah it’s only a few weeks, really. It’s not a big deal.”

Oliver smiles, beatifically might be the word. Or resigned. “Right.”

“Right.” Connor answers, like a candle being blown out.

“When do you leave?”

“Uh,” the silence of licking his lips different from the silence of grabbing the back of his own neck is different from the silence of both of these at once, “next Thursday.”

“Oh.”

He falls to a crouch. Too fast. Everything with Connor is always so fast. “What is it?”

“It’s fine.” He says, with another try at the failed smile.

“What is it?”

“Some lab work,” Oliver says with a shrug. “I can probably still drive you to the airport? Or reschedule. It’ll be fine.”

“No,” Connor is too loud in his guilt, it screams out of his skin. “I…I was supposed to take you to all of your tests and checkups and-“

“Connor I’m a big boy I can drive myself,” Oliver sighs.

“I promised.” He says, like it is true and he’s surprised. It is, he is.

When he closes his eyes and thinks of Connor’s lips on his arms, of Connor curled up on the other side of the too big couch, of Connor asleep in the 6am light. It’s easier to smile. “That’s alright.”

“Oliver I-“

“It’s really alright I was never going to hold you to this- it.” He swallows his misstep. “Hold you to it.”

But Connor’s whole life is prying apart badly spoken lies, seeing the weak foundations to make his out of steel. “What do you mean?”

“I mean you were always going to have a busy day or an exam week –“

“That’s not what you said, you said this. Oliver I’m not – it’s a really big deal or Annalise would have never let me so much as apply I’m not.” He says, trying to echo his words with his eyes. Steal foundations. “I’m not running out on you.”

“You’re making it sound like I’m sixteen and pregnant,” he says, the smile easy now (Connor elbow deep in dish soap, Connor’s wet hair in his eyes, Connor’s own child-like secret smile). “And this is – a really great opportunity. I’m so proud of you. We should celebrate. But no champagne! I – think I have some diet Sprite somewhere…”

He sidesteps the other man, rummages through his fridge, and doesn’t let his thoughts linger. The sprite is behind the berries beside the lettuce. He should get ice.

“I can’t do this.”

If I press this silly switch, it’ll be dark in front of my eyes and that might be nice. “Right. Well like I said I wasn’t going to hold you to any of it.”

He’s tempted to press the switch and cover himself in the dark. But there are hands on his arms, the familiar cool jolt of a ring on the right.

“No Oliver, goddamn it I mean I can’t fuck off for two months I can’t just leave you hear to come in and out of doctor’s offices and labs and pharmacies and to get in bed alone every night I can’t. I’m not going to.

“The hell you aren’t,” he shouts. He’s too close to mean it, there’s a half liter of diet Sprite to think about. “Connor you beat Michaela for this summer shadowing if you don’t go she will personally try to kill you.”

“Yeah and she’d do it to but I don’t care I … that’s not my priority right now.”

“So what,” he laughs, he finally laughs, “your priority is taking care of a dying man-“

Connor’s hands are shaking so bad, it’s so similar to that night. “You are not fucking _dying_.”

“I know.” He tells himself that sometimes. That he knows. He knows he knows he knows, like he knows that sometimes his knowledge is lies. “I’m sorry, I know that I’m…going to be fine. So you need to go and take this chance okay? I mean, this is a chance for Annalise to respect you and you’ll be top of your class until you graduate. People will throw jobs at you. You have to go. It’s not that much time.”

“Oliver –“

“Your sister will be so proud.” He says, because he’s learned to find weakness and he’d never known what to do with that until now. “And so will your mom if you can get a hold of her this time and –“

“I’m not freaking going okay? I shouldn’t have even applied.”

“But you did.” Oliver snaps, the anger coming and going lightning fast. “Apply. And that’s a good thing! Connor the last, I swear, the last thing I want is to hold you back. I want you to go and enjoy freaking Paris like you should. I mean it. In every way. Just…please. Please be safe and…”

“Are you breaking up with me?”

Is he? He should. He might. If only he had the balls for that. “I have no right to-“

“No, you don’t.” Connor presses up against him, takes away his breathing room, his space to lie. “You don’t have the right to tell me to fuck off to France and cheat on you just because, why? Because you feel guilty about being – “

“Yeah.” He admits, quiet and honest at last. “Yeah I feel guilty Connor, all the time. God knows, if I were negative maybe you’d have finally gotten sick of my taking it slow and wanting something serious and my…feelings for you and you would have left. But I went and got fucking sick and now you can’t. I see it every day, Connor, the way your eyes are always looking at the door like it’s about to explode? Like you want it to hurry up and blow up so you can get out? And I’ve been selfish. Because you were … you were kind and you stuck around. But you applied to a two month internship in France you never even told me about and I’m…glad. That you’re still think about yourself. That I’m not taking over your life. So I think you should go. Now, Connor. Go and pack and… maybe call me when you get back.”

“Is that what you think that’s about?” There’s no space for the words to bounce about. “You think I’m just waiting for a chance to get out?”

Oliver doesn’t really think he has to answer back.

“I stare at the door because I’m afraid of what’s outside. I’m afraid of … things I don’t want to bring into your life. I’m afraid of every fucked up thing I’m being trained to take in stride because you – you are so much… better, purer than all of that.”

“I think we’ve left the concept of pure behind.” But he wishes he was. He wishes there were no lingering fears, that he felt whole enough to be held like this, with no space in between.

“Yeah well fuck that. Fuck clean and fuck infected, you aren’t that. Oliver, you are so much – to me. You’re… you are everything but that. So don’t…don’t let me do this. Don’t let me go out and get wrapped up in all that just … ask me to stay.” Connor takes Oliver’s face in his hands, cradles him close, lips to lips, lungs to mouth. “Because I want to, that’s all I want, screw Annalise and all of France I hate that door because outside is everything I was supposed to want but in here is the only thing I want to have.”

“I can’t save you from that,” Oliver whispers, “any more than you can save me from what I have.”

Connor kisses him, fierce at first and desperate at last. Until he pulls away and whispers so quiet that it could be the echo of his rushing heart at that. “I don’t want the door to blow up Ollie I want it to be strong enough to hold everything else back.”

“Well it’s not going to do that.” Oliver says as he takes a step and a breath away from the other man. “That’s why you have to take this opportunity in France. You have to get all in that…scary shit and…find your way back. Okay? If you … if you still love me back when it’s done then, just find your way back.”

**Author's Note:**

> So I've written a couple of Coliver fic and gotten NO comments but a bunch of kudos and likes? So I would loveeeeee some comments if you have the time <3


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